Jan Freidlin
Romantic Concerto: in 3 Movements
Trombone and piano (reduction)
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Publisher: Cherry Classics Music
Date of Publication: 2019
URL: http://www.cherryclassics.com
Score and solo part
Primary Genre: Solo Tenor Trombone - with piano
Romantic Concerto: in 3 Movements
Trombone and piano (reduction)
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Publisher: Cherry Classics Music
Date of Publication: 2019
URL: http://www.cherryclassics.com
Score and solo part
Primary Genre: Solo Tenor Trombone - with piano
Jan Freidlin was born in Russia in 1944; since 1990 he has lived in Israel and is currently professor of composition at the Levinsky College of Music in Tel Aviv. His published work includes numerous pieces of chamber music; he has also written five symphonies. This concerto, composed in 2004, is one of the most beautiful to have been written for our instrument. It is an engaging and highly original piece that is not quite like anything I’ve seen before; in some respects, it is a successor to Prokofiev’s ‘Classical Symphony.’ In this reduction, it is also a technically demanding work for both players. The trombone part is given in bass and tenor clef; the overall range is G-b-flat¹. Out of a total 488 measures, the soloist has 60 measures of rest, including 20 each at the beginning of the second and third movements. The first and third movements are in alla breve meter, the second in common time. There are no meter changes in any movement. The first movement (5:40), Moderato, is an extended cantabile, playing for 150 measures without any rest for the soloist, staying mostly in the middle register. Some sections of the accompanying part are minimally notated, and the pianist is instructed to improvise. The tonality of this movement is indefinite. In the second movement (4:00), Vivace energico (attacca), there are many off-beat accents in the trombone part and percussive, off-beat cluster chords in the piano part. At the end of the movement there is an instruction to the pianist to play on the bass strings with ‘sticks of timpani’ while downward glissandi are played simultaneously with the left hand on the keyboard in the same register. This movement is in D minor, though its overall tonality is still somewhat free. The third movement, (3:30) Adagietto, is a beautiful song, beginning in D minor, with a central section in D major. The trombone range is B-b-flat¹, playing over a soft accompaniment, in which the pianist’s left hand has to play many intervals greater than two octaves. The final chord is tonally ambiguous; the trombone plays diminuendo from an already soft dynamic on a¹, sustained over three measures. Please hold your applause, and don’t drop any pins.
Reviewer: Keith Davies Jones
Review Published June 23, 2023
Review Published June 23, 2023